C.R.O.W. (The Union Series) (5 page)

‘Yeah.’

There was
something chilling in the revelation. In the military you were a number. Oh, of
course you were encouraged to use your initiative and develop your own character
as a trooper, but in the end you were still just a number. Challenger carried
more drop troopers than it needed to carry because the Union knew that men
would die, and so the more the merrier.

I saw that Woody
was walking toward us, the trace of a grin on his face. He was a big lad, far
larger than me or Greggerson and probably in his mid-twenties, with a rounded
face and a thick mop of brown hair.

‘Hurry up,
you two. The toilets don’t clean themselves.’

My heart
sank, should have seen that one coming. Even in space you had to clean the
ablutions, and conveniently the platoon now had extra pairs of hands to help
out.

‘We’re just
finishing off,’ I said, trying to sound like it didn’t bother me.

‘Well hurry
up, coz I’m not doing it.’

So there we
ended up, on our first day aboard a warship orbiting a planet in a star system
light years from Earth, cleaning out toilets and sinks like we’d done
everywhere else. All five of us new lads had been rounded up for the task and
had been left alone to do the job without help.

‘This is
pump
,’
Gilbert summed up what everyone was thinking.

That was when
the doors to the ablutions slid open. I only had a couple of seconds to see as
a gang of troopers charged into the room wearing respirators to hide their
faces, each with a pillowslip filled with boots slung over his shoulder like a
crude weapon.

None of us
had time to defend ourselves, we were quickly overwhelmed by a flurry of blows
that forced me to fall to the ground and curl into a ball. I didn’t say a word,
I just took it. What else could I do?

‘Welcome to
Challenger, crow bags!’ Somebody jeered.

They were
gone as suddenly as they came, whooping and laughing as they made their exit
from the ablutions, leaving us battered and bruised on the half-mopped floor.

Welcome to
Challenger
, I thought,
Home sweet home.

4: PT

The other new
lads, including me, followed the platoon to a circumference corridor at the
stern end of the ship, our battered sides still smarting. I pretended it didn’t
hurt, not wanting to give anybody the satisfaction of seeing me in pain.
Occasionally somebody in the crowd would look over at us whilst we walked and
smile. They whispered amongst each other, no doubt talking about what they
could do to us next. I tried to ignore them and focused my mind on what was
coming up instead; my first fitness session with my new platoon.

Physical
Training for troopers on board a troopship was a serious business for obvious
reasons. Without constant training a company could rapidly become unfit, and so
their ability to fight would suffer as a consequence. The age old saying went ‘
a
drop of sweat in training is worth a pint of blood on the battlefield
,’ and
it was true. Not only did poor fitness affect our ability to run and to fight,
it also increased the risk of medical complications during the high G-forces of
a drop or caused problems for us breathing with the respirator.

There were
two types of fitness training carried out on ship. The first was gym sessions
using the comprehensive equipment kept in the ship’s gymnasium. The problem
with the array of machines, however, was that no matter how good they were they
couldn’t replicate the true motions of running - which was something we would
do a lot of by the very nature of our job as dropship infantry - and they also
became awfully boring.

The solution
to this was the second option - running. Because the ship had so many
circumference corridors it was easy for the Physical Training Instructors to
close one of them off and get us to run around them. Still sounds boring,
right? Well, it was the job of the PTIs to make PT the opposite of boring - as
absolutely horrible a thrashing as they could make it.

It was enough
to make me forget my bruised body seeing our PTI for the first time though. Even
in battalion they fulfilled their stereotype, with slick gelled hair - how did
they get it up to the ship anyway, and more importantly - why? And their
unnecessarily tight t-shirts that barely contained their bulging muscles.

‘We’ll be
doing shuttle runs today gents, relatively simple,’ the PTI rubbed his palms
together gleefully in anticipation of the session he had planned for us, ‘Nobody
is to
jog
around the corridor. Sprint the whole way. I’ll be watching
you, so don’t cheat! Cheating equals pain!’

We listened
intently, jogging on the spot to warm our muscles up.

Not intently
enough, apparently, ‘Am I
boring
you…?’ A mischievous smirk grew on the
PTIs face.

We shook our
heads, all thirty or so of us. Somebody chuckled from within the huddle,
knowing full well that we were to be thrashed whether we looked interested or
not.

‘Oh, so now
you think it’s funny -
two laps sound funny
?’

‘Yes, Staff,’
somebody replied.

The PTI
smiled. It was all part of the session, he was going to send us anyway. I never
fully understood how a PTIs mind worked, and I probably never would.

‘Two laps,
then. Last fifteen go again...GO!’

We sprinted
around the corridor and my battered body protested painfully as I went. I
focused on rotating the giant wheel that was Challenger with my feet as I
desperately tried to get to the front of the pack. Although they had spent four
months on ship from Earth, and then a whole week of shore leave on Uralis, the
platoon were surprisingly fit. Instead of being right at the front as I had
expected to be I found myself fighting to stay in with the middle of the pack.

The PTI
appeared again over the horizon, calling out to us as we ran, ‘Come on, let’s
go, don’t be the last fifteen and go again! It pays to be a winner, gents! Get
up there, you!’ The PTI shouted at me as I passed him for my second lap as fast
as my legs would take me, trying to overtake the man in front.

I pushed
myself harder, as it was the first time I had taken part in fitness with my
platoon I was eager to show off how fit I was, but in the end I only managed to
just scrape in with the first fifteen. The remainder were sent around again as
I fought to regain my breath.

‘You’re crow,
aren’t you?’ The PTI was talking to me, I realised, and I straightened to
attention automatically, as had been drummed into me by months at the mercy of
the training staff on Uralis.

‘Yes, Staff!’

‘You should
be at the front, then, shouldn’t you,’ he scolded.

‘Yes, Staff,’
I panted.

Out of all of
the new arrivals only me and Greggerson had managed to avoid going round the
corridor again, but I doubted it would be wise to mention that to the PTI. Why
was I the one being gripped?

Once the
unlucky fifteen had finished their second lap and stood gasping for breath, the
PTI began the explanation of his PT session. We were lined along the wall in
two ranks and paired off. The man stood at the front of the pair was the number
one and the man behind was the number two. The number one did a lap of the
corridor, whilst the number two performed an exercise dictated by the PTI,
press-ups for instance.

‘Nice and
simple, today, gents,’ the PTI summarised, ‘Let’s burn some of that shore leave
off them bellies!’

I was the
number one, so it was me who would run first while my partner exercised.

‘You better
be fast, man,’ my partner threatened from behind, ‘Or you and me will fall out
big time.’

‘Number two’s
will be doing wide arm press-ups! In position - ready!’

The number
two’s dropped to the ground and adopted the wide arm press up position, ‘One
lap! Stand by………..’ we braced ourselves to run, ‘……..GO!’

Half of the
platoon, including me, sprinted around the corridor as our partners did press-ups.
The idea was that the fear of letting down your team mate drove you to push
even harder than you might normally, because the faster you were the less
exercises he had to do. It was a simple yet effective method of getting troopers
to annihilate themselves whilst the PTI barely had to do a thing.

‘Every single
day we do this,’ the young blonde lad from my room moaned to me as we ran.

‘You must be
sick of it,’ I replied between gasps.

‘Shut up!’ a
young skinny man hissed from beside me. I shook my head in disappointment at
myself, I should know better than to talk during PT. If I had the breath to
talk it meant I wasn’t working hard enough.

The PTI
emerged over the horizon again along with the line of troopers in the press up
position.

‘All the way
in!’ he called, ‘Don’t jack on your mate!’

One by one we
relieved our partners, releasing them from their exercise. We stood, jogging on
the spot to keep our muscles moving and prevent them from seizing up, it kept
the PTI happy too. I was chuffed with myself - I had been one of the first to
get back - so my partner couldn’t say I’d jacked on him. In the military, ‘jack’
is a very dirty word. If you’re jack it means you’re not a team player, you let
people down and only look out for yourself. People who were jack got other
people killed and were hated more than anything. You could call somebody all
sorts of words and he might not bat an eyelid, but call a man jack, and he
would never take it well, especially if it was true.

‘You got a
problem, boy?’ A harsh voice asked, and I jumped. The man who moved to stand in
front of me was dressed in PT kit identical to mine, but it was easy to see he
had some kind of rank, though what it was I was unsure. He was a broad-shouldered
man in his late twenties with piercing blue eyes and severe acne scarring to
his face. He had an additional scar that formed a near perfectly round, albeit
broken, circle on his cheek, obviously the result of being stabbed by a broken
bottle in one of England’s notoriously classy drinking establishments. His eyes
stabbed at mine as he leaned close to my face, his unpleasantly odorous breath
burning against my cheeks.

I chose to go with the safe
option, mid-way in the rank structure.

No….um….Corporal.’

‘I’m not a
Corporal
,’
he spat the word as though he found it distasteful, ‘Try again.’

‘No, Sergeant,’
I cursed inwardly, and my cheeks flushed with blood as I felt the eyes of the
entire platoon upon me. Even the PTI had stopped to look. During PT the PTI was
in charge, but ultimately the platoon sergeant was God; the terrifying
disciplinarian who ruled the platoon with an iron fist and I had somehow
already managed to annoy him.

‘That’s
right, I’m your platoon sergeant. So if you haven’t got a problem, why are you
shaking your head at one of my lance corporals?’

‘I didn’t, I…’

‘I watched
you do it,’ the sergeant jabbed a massive finger at my chest, ‘Are you calling
me a liar, boy?’ He was from Southampton, I recognised the accent. Being from
Portsmouth I was never going to be in his good books, as the two cities
despised each other since time began.

I gulped - I
couldn’t argue - not with the platoon sergeant of all people. Within a dropship
platoon the only man higher than the platoon sergeant was the platoon
commander, but even that was up for debate!

‘No, Sergeant,’
I focused my eyes on the wall behind him, not daring to look him in the eye.

‘So now
you’re the liar, then?’

There was no
response I could give that wouldn’t be wrong. I chose not to say a word and
instead tried to look as scared and stupid as I could for the sympathy card. In
retrospect, I probably didn’t need to try; I was probably scared and stupid
enough.

The platoon
sergeant drew closer, his teeth bared, ‘Mess with me, boy, and you won’t even
make it to New Earth, understand?’

‘Yes, Sergeant.’

He looked
across to the PTI, ‘Carry on, mate.’

‘Roger!
Number one’s in position!’

I dropped to
the press-up position, my hands cold against the metal. Bruised abdominal
muscles screamed as I fought to keep my back straight.

‘Number two’s,
one lap, stand by………GO!’

As I pushed
the world away a familiar voice taunted me from my right, ‘You ain’t gonna last
five minutes here, crow bag.’

I looked over
and saw Woody performing press-ups two down the line from me, grinning from ear-to-ear.
It was probably his idea to get us in the ablutions and attack us, I thought.
The sick bastard was enjoying seeing me suffer. I decided there and then that I
had never hated anybody as much as Woody.

I realised my
eyes were wet and looked to the ground and blinked it off.

What had I
done to deserve this? I hadn’t done anything wrong! As I exercised in my own
little world of pain I finally realised that I had made a terrible mistake
joining the dropship infantry - and I was going to pay for it.

The PT
session went on for another fifty minutes, going up to two laps and even three
at times as the PTI pushed us to our limits. I kept my mouth shut throughout -
well, not to talk anyway - not even daring to look at anyone.

After PT the
platoon were sent back to the accommodation to shower and change, while me and
the other new lads were kept behind by the platoon commander. We lined the wall
of the circumference corridor, which had become silent in the absence of the
platoon’s heavy breathing. I listened to the strange and ghostly sounds of the
ship echoing through the superstructure whilst the lieutenant shared a
whispered conversation with the platoon sergeant.

‘Well,’ the
platoon commander began, walking out in front of the five of us. He was a
slight man who appeared a little younger than the platoon sergeant. It was
normal for a platoon commander to be younger than his platoon sergeant, the
latter of whom had climbed up through the ranks from being a private like me.
Platoon commanders came into command directly from their training, but that was
because their training lasted several years and was far more selective than
ours was. ‘I don’t know if I’m the first to say ‘welcome on board’
but…..welcome on board.’

He wasn’t
the first to welcome us
, I thought, and I had the bruises to prove it. I
remained still, my hands clasped firmly behind my back.

‘My name is
Lieutenant Barkley and I am your new platoon commander. I apologize for not
greeting you immediately upon arrival, but it
was
early in the morning, plus
it gives you a chance to settle in and get your heads around it. This platoon
and this ship are your new home.’

Like all
officers I had met during my short time in the army, the platoon commander was
extremely well-spoken, with an accent that I had never encountered until being
conscripted into the Union army. He wasn’t necessarily from a particularly
affluent background, the dropship infantry was one of the few places in the
Union where money and background didn’t count for anything. Officers did, however,
have to be of a certain intellectual calibre, most notably in language, since
they were expected to be able to communicate with unit commanders from any one
of the Union states who might not speak English. He had undoubtedly been to
college, and perhaps even university, a privilege reserved for the gifted - or
the rich.

‘I take it
you all have an inkling of what might be coming?’

We nodded as
one, ‘Yes, Sir.’

The platoon
commander returned the nod, everyone knew that the Union would return to New
Earth and that the time for battle would be very soon indeed, ‘We’re waiting
for an announcement within the next couple of days, and potentially we might
leave the Hope system very soon. Therefore I appreciate that this is a
difficult time for any trooper to arrive from training. You have a great deal
more to learn - and very quickly. No doubt you’re feeling very homesick, lonely
and scared right now, especially with this daunting task laid out before you.